Episode 6: April 13, 2005

Wrongfully Arrested
Reporter: Hannah Wallis

This
business of Police handing out tickets without fully checking the
driver's identity refuses to go away. Take the astonishing
story of Auckland woman Michelle Mane - an innocent woman who
was actually jailed for someone else's driving offence.

A woman
Michelle once knew used Michelle's driver's license details when
she was stopped for a drink-driving offence. Then she actually
appeared in Court, still using Michelle's name, and was sentenced
to community service and disqualified from driving for six months.
When she failed to front up for the community service police issued
a warrant for her arrest and came looking for Michelle.

Of course
she protested her innocence but she says Police pretty much said -
"do you know how many times we've heard that excuse?". Once down
the Police station, they decided she was a flight risk, and put her
in a jail cell for the night.

Michelle
says it was awful, the worst night of her life.
She did ring a lawyer, who advised her it would have to wait till
morning, to be sorted. She appeared in Court and was released on
bail. But it took another four months and three Court appearances
before she finally cleared her name and saw the right person
charged, convicted and dealt with.

And for
that four months - she couldn't drive her car because she was
disqualified - well of course, the real offender was, but in
Michelle's name. Unbelievable.

How easy
was it for someone else to pretend to be Michelle? Well, she says
if only the Police had insisted on seeing this other woman's photo
driver's license - none of this would ever have happened. We
invited the Police onto the show. They say they're undertaking a
thorough investigation but in the meantime they make these
points:

Police
regret that Michelle was subjected to an arrest and court
appearance.
Police agree that at the time of her arrest, Michelle denied
knowledge of the incident.
Police say they were unable to validate this claim at that
time.
Michelle did not make a complaint to the custody sergeant at the
time, and has made no formal complaint since.

Police say because the woman who pretended to be Michelle was
originally summonsed, rather than arrested, there were no
fingerprints or photographs taken which could be compared with the
real Michelle when she protested her innocence.

Fair Go
awaits with interest the result of that "thorough
investigation".

And
there's been a major breakthrough in the case of Alex Spijkerman -
one we've been negotiating for the past couple of weeks. Alex's
been fighting over $3000 worth of traffic fines for two and a half
years. The fines actually belonged to three other people
who'd claimed to be him. But - Police have now withdrawn all of
those offence notices - and they've apologised.

In the end, Alex and his Mum Rosie actually tracked down the real
offender themselves and organised for him to make a Police
statement.

Alex is
delighted.

Wilson car park
Reporter: Kevin Milne

Viewers
have complained about the Infringement Notices they get for
overstaying Pay and Display Parks at Wilson Parking. One viewer,
who got a $50 ticket for staying 15 minutes too long, took Wilson's
to the Disputes Tribunal and won. He argued that private businesses
cannot "fine" customers, only charge them Liquidated Damages
representing the actual losses the infringement caused the
company.

The
tribunal referee found that Wilson's were attempting to claim a
penalty fee which they were not entitled to. The complainant didn't
have to pay Wilson's any money.

Fair Go
believes that the "liquidated damages" demanded by Wilsons, and the
cost of $160 to get your car back if it were towed away after 15
minutes, are a rip-off by comparison to the fines issued by local
councils.

However,
Wilson Parking argues that their liquidated damages do represent
actual losses to the firm. They say people who overstay their pay
and display parks are breaching their contract with the carpark
owner and that warnings are posted on signs in the carpark.

If you've
already paid out on a pay and display ticket issued by Wilsons you,
also, may wish to try to get your money back from the Disputes
Tribunal.

The
arguments put to the Tribunal by Dr Roderick Mulgan in his
successful challenge are as follows:

"Liquidated Damages may only be claimed for the actual loss arising
from a contractual breach, even where the amount is specified in a
contract, or in this case, a sign. It is a basic legal principle
that an injured party in a contract may only seek what they have
lost: they may not make a profit from he situation.

"As the
parking company had not lost $50 for my extra fifteen minutes of
parking time, it seemed to me that their claim was invalid. The
cost of the attendant was a fixed one, and had to be met whether I
or anyone else parked in their park or not. The only identifiable
loss was for the extra time in the parking space. (i.e. 75cents in
a $3 per hour park)

"Wilson
Parking refused to accept this argument, although they did not
provide a rebuttal of it."

Zoomed off
Reporter: Greg Boyed

The spirit
of Christmas was alive and well when our three consumers, Meryl
Young, Heather Bradding and Rhonda Gilmore stepped into Westfield
Malls in December 2004... it's long gone now.

All three bought scooters from Zoomtoys. A toy trader which set up
in the middle of Westfield malls. And all three had warranties
saying if anything went wrong with the scooters within 30 days..
Zoomtoys would replace the faulty scooters.

But Zoomtoys left town before the first verse of Rudolph the
Rednose Reindeer was finished and haven't been heard from or seen
since.

Zoomtoys boss Zeev Dzialoshinsky left phone numbers, none of which
actually allowed the disgruntled customers to get hold of
him.

Same deal with the Zoomtoys website which boasted about scooters
being made to German standards, but never actually yielded a
response.

So what about Westfield? They were the ones who decided Zoomtoys
were a credible trader and allowed them into their malls, surely
they should shoulder some of the responsibility?

Westfield Stress they have no legal obligation to Zoomtoy
customers...and this may well be right. But Zoomtoys has
zoomed and Westfield is still around. Westfield says it has done
its bit by making contact with Zoomtoys via the web.